Who Are You Relying On?

Today's blog has been contributed by David Trotta:

We’ve all done it.  We receive a gift from someone with a warm smile and a “thank you” only to put the gift on a shelf or in a drawer somewhere to collect dust.  Oh, don’t get me wrong, at the time, we received it with joy and went on to think about all the ways we were going to use the new gift, but life got in the way.  We became busy with other things, and soon forgot we even had the gift.  (On a personal note, I have tools that were given to me over a year ago and are still in the box, unopened.)

Now imagine I have a job in front of me that requires cutting a lot of wood, and I proceed to manually cut the wood with a hand saw forgetting that I had this nice shiny power tool on the shelf and still in the box.  Pretty foolish, uh?

Yet, as Christians we do that with the Holy Spirit.  We received the Holy Spirit with much joy and gladness from our heavenly Father, but then, somewhere along the way we stopped relying on Him, and instead started relying on our own strength.  We relegate Him to a back seat in our life.

We have this daunting task in front of us – living a life that honors God in a world that opposes us at every turn, but we forget that the Holy Spirit of God was given to guide, empower, and comfort us.  Instead, we go through our Christian walk struggling to do the right thing in our own feeble strength, which often leads to failure and feelings of discouragement and frustration.  We view the biblical promises of “peace that passes all understanding” and “joy unspeakable” as unattainable goals, rather than reality, as we drudge through life.

Listen to what the bibles says in John 14:26 about the purpose of the Holy Spirit in our lives – “But the Comforter (Counselor, Helper, Intercessor, Advocate, Strengthener, Standby), the Holy Spirit, Whom the Father will send in My name [in My place, to represent Me and act on My behalf], He will teach you all things. And He will cause you to recall (will remind you of, bring to your remembrance) everything I have told you.” (AMP)

What an incredible and powerful resource!  God gave us His very Spirit to lead us through life.  Today, let’s choose to rely on the Holy Spirit and not our efforts.  When we do, our sinful nature will be put to death (Romans 8:13), and our lives will be marked by repeated victories, rather than defeats.